Saldana v. Garza

• Decision Date: 07 September 1982
• Docket Number: No. 81-2111,81-2111
• Citation: 684 F.2d 1159
• Parties: Jose SALDANA, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Antonio GARZA and Ricardo Olvera, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

Page 1159

684 F.2d 1159

Jose SALDANA, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Antonio GARZA and Ricardo Olvera, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 81-2111.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

Sept. 7, 1982.

James C. Harrington, San Juan, Tex., Charles S. Sims, for plaintiff-appellant.

Jones & Lewis, B. Buck Pettitt, John E. Lewis, McAllen, Tex., for defendants-appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas.

Before BROWN, GOLDBERG and POLITZ, Circuit Judges.

GOLDBERG, Circuit Judge:

The plaintiff-appellant brought this civil rights damage action against two police officers who allegedly subjected him to arrest and detention without probable cause. Following a trial in federal district court, a jury found that the plaintiff's arrest was based upon probable cause. Accordingly, judgment was entered in favor of the defendant police officers. The plaintiff then brought this appeal, arguing that there had been numerous errors in the trial proceedings.

Our review of the record reveals that the defendant police officers asserted their "good-faith" as a bar to personal liability and that the plaintiff failed to rebut this affirmative defense. We therefore conclude that insofar as these defendants were cloaked by the special protections afforded by a qualified immunity, the judgment dismissing the plaintiff's claims must be affirmed.

I. FACTS

This appeal arises from events that transpired during the late evening hours of February 15, 1976 in the south Texas city of McAllen. That night, plaintiff-appellant Jose Saldana was standing near his home, ¹ drinking beer and listening to a car stereo along with his father and his sister's fiance.

At approximately 11:00 p. m., police officers Antonio Garza and Ricardo Olvera were on routine patrol in the neighborhood, cruising in an area approximately one-and-a-half blocks from the Saldana property. Hearing loud music, shouting, and "gritos," ² the two officers followed the sounds in an effort to investigate. ³ At the end of this aural trail, Officers Garza and Olvera found the Saldana trio.

Officer Garza stepped out of the patrol car, approached the revelers, and attempted to read the McAllen noise ordinance to them. He then told the three to quiet down and lower their stereo. Saldana's response was hostile. Just what Saldana said to Officer Garza remains unclear, ⁴ but both police officers testified that Saldana was definitely angry and appeared to be drunk as well. ⁵

Officer Garza insisted that Saldana calm down, stop yelling and turn down his radio. When Saldana refused, Garza proceeded to place him under arrest. Saldana resisted and a brief struggle ensued, however he was quickly restrained and placed in the patrol car. Saldana was charged with "public intoxication" and "disorderly conduct by abusive language," held at the McAllen police station for about forty minutes, and then released.

There has been no allegation that Officers Garza and Olvera knew Jose Saldana or harbored any personal animus toward him, nor has there been any suggestion that Saldana was in any way abused once he had been restrained and placed in the patrol car.

II. PROCEEDINGS BELOW

The procedural origins of this suit can be traced to a class action pending in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas: Guadalupe Cano, et al. v. Jesse Colbath, et al. (S.D.Tex., Brownsville Div., CA 76-B-52). In Cano v. Colbath, the plaintiffs alleged that the City of McAllen, its police chief, and certain individual police officers were responsible for a pattern and practice of police misconduct. The plaintiffs sought injunctive relief as well as monetary compensation for those McAllen residents who had allegedly suffered from specific instances of official wrongdoing.

On April 10, 1980, the district court ordered that the damage claims in Cano v. Colbath be severed from the class action and directed each of the individual claimants to file separate suits. Jose Saldana, appellant in the case now before us, was one of the individual claimants in Cano v. Colbath. Pursuant to the order severing his claim from the class action, Saldana filed this suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, seeking $60,000 in compensatory and punitive damages from Officers Garza and Olvera.

As the basis for his damage claims against Garza and Olvera, Saldana alleged that on the night of February 15, 1976, he had been arrested and detained without probable cause and that the defendants had used unreasonable force in making the allegedly illegal arrest. ⁶ Specifically, Saldana argued that he was neither "publicly intoxicated" ⁷ nor "disturbing the peace" ⁸ when he was arrested. Saldana contended that he could not have been guilty of "public intoxication" as defined by Texas law because he was not so intoxicated as to pose an immediate threat to himself or to others and because he was not in a "public place" at the time of his arrest. ⁹ In a similar vein, Saldana argued that his angry words with Officer Garza could not constitute a violation of the Texas "abusive language" statute because he was not in a public place at the time of his arrest and because his utterances did not "tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace." In essence, the plaintiff litigated this civil damage suit much as if he were defending himself in a criminal action, arguing that he was not breaking the law when he was arrested and that therefore his arrest was not supported by probable cause.

In response, Officers Garza and Olvera denied Saldana's allegations, asserted that they did have probable cause to arrest, and that they did not use unreasonable force. Moreover, the defendants affirmatively claimed that they had acted "in good faith, and with a reasonable belief in the lawfulness of their acts." ¹⁰

A three day jury trial was held. Following the close of all testimony and arguments, the court directed a verdict in favor of Officer Olvera but allowed the jury to consider the evidence against Officer Garza. The jury was charged, given special interrogatories, and returned a finding that the arrest was supported by probable cause and that Garza had not used unreasonable force. Judgment was entered upon the verdict and the plaintiff then brought this appeal.

III. ISSUES ON APPEAL

Appellant Saldana has advanced an array of interesting and not wholly insubstantial arguments on appeal; he contends that the trial court erred in its evidentiary rulings, in refusing to direct a verdict in his favor, in directing a verdict in favor of Officer Olvera, in its jury instructions, in its formulation of special interrogatories, and in allowing the jury to consider the police officers' "good-faith" immunity defense. ¹¹ However, we find that it is only necessary to address the last of these many issues: the question of the defendants' entitlement to a "good-faith" qualified immunity defense.

IV. THE QUALIFIED IMMUNITY DEFENSE

It is axiomatic that public officials whose positions entail the exercise of discretion enjoy the special protections of a qualified immunity from personal liability in § 1983 damage actions. Harlow v. Fitzgerald, --- U.S. ----, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982); Dennis v. Sparks, 449 U.S. 24, 101 S.Ct. 183, 66 L.Ed.2d 185 (1980); Gomez v. Toledo, 446 U.S. 635, 100 S.Ct. 1920, 64 L.Ed.2d 572 (1980); Procunier v. Navarette, 434 U.S. 555, 98 S.Ct. 855, 55 L.Ed.2d 24 (1978); Wood v. Strickland, 420 U.S. 308, 95 S.Ct. 992, 43 L.Ed.2d 214 (1975); Scheuer v. Rhodes, 416 U.S. 232, 94 S.Ct. 1683, 40 L.Ed.2d 90 (1974). ¹² This "qualified" or "good-faith" immunity is an affirmative defense. Dennis v. Sparks, 449 U.S. 24, 29, 101 S.Ct. 183, 187, 66 L.Ed.2d 185 (1980); Gomez v. Toledo, 446 U.S. 635, 100 S.Ct. 1920, 64 L.Ed.2d 572 (1980). Thus, it is the defendant who bears the burden of pleading his good faith ¹³ and establishing that he was acting within the scope of his discretionary authority when the allegedly wrongful acts occurred. Williams v. Treen, 671 F.2d 892, 897 (5th Cir. 1982); Barker v. Norman, 651 F.2d 1107, 1120 (5th Cir. 1981).

Once a defendant has asserted the affirmative defense of qualified immunity and has established that any allegedly tortious conduct was undertaken pursuant to the exercise of his discretionary authority, the burden then shifts to the plaintiff to rebut this "good faith" defense. Garris v. Rowland, 678 F.2d 1264, 1271 (5th Cir. 1982). ¹⁴ In order to breach the qualified immunity defense, the plaintiff must establish that a defendant's allegedly wrongful conduct violated clearly established law. Harlow v. Fitzgerald, --- U.S. ----, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 2738-39, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982). ¹⁵

"Government officials performing discretionary functions ... are shielded from liability for civil damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights."

Id. 102 S.Ct. at 2738.

Thus, unless a § 1983 plaintiff can establish that the defendant official has violated clearly settled law, his damage action must be dismissed. Id. ¹⁶

It is undisputed that the defendants in this case were acting pursuant to their discretionary authority when they arrested Jose Saldana. ¹⁷ Moreover, there is no question but that these defendants asserted their affirmative defense of qualified immunity. ¹⁸ Once the defendants asserted and established their entitlement to a qualified immunity, the burden of proof and persuasion on this issue shifted to the plaintiff, see note 14. It became Jose Saldana's burden to breach the defendants' good-faith immunity. Id. To recover monetary damages, Saldana was required to show that the defendants had violated clearly established law, see note 15.

We have carefully reviewed the briefs and record and find that the plaintiff-appellant offered only one argument in support of his crucial claim that the defendants' conduct had violated "clearly established" law. Specifically, Saldana suggested that Officers Garza and...